


maybe we're just gonna live forever, maybe heaven's a mistake

by prettydizzeed



Category: Shadowhunters (TV), The Shadowhunter Chronicles - All Media Types
Genre: Asexual Raphael Santiago, Implied/Referenced Sexual Assault, Internalized Homophobia, M/M, Self-Acceptance, Sex Repulsion
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-23
Updated: 2017-07-23
Packaged: 2018-12-05 17:49:24
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11583138
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/prettydizzeed/pseuds/prettydizzeed
Summary: Raphael presses the pendant into his palm and looks at Magnus. “How did you become okay with it?”Magnus gives a flourish of his hand. “After the whole ‘half demon blood, scorned by the earth as a monster’ thing, liking boys wasn't that big of a deal.” He sees Raphael's expression and adds gently, “But it's different for everyone.”Raphael looks at his hands. Lets go of the cross. “How do I become okay with it?”





	maybe we're just gonna live forever, maybe heaven's a mistake

**Author's Note:**

> title is from "Gates" by Tyler Glenn

He prays before biting her like it'll make a difference. Like preemptive forgiveness exists, like it would apply to him if it did.

He prays the next time he sees her, too, and again and again as she sabotages his senses, twists his instincts against him. He repeats it until it echoes in his head even in moments when the words have no meaning: _Father, forgive her; she knows not what she does._

His fingertips still ache against the rosary. _Lead me not into temptation. Deliver me, deliver me, deliver me._ He says no and she says yes and afterwards, she kisses him.

She says _you know you want it_ because she can't understand that he is not the hunger, that he is the man whose skin is a contradiction, damned yet sealed with a cross, and he did not want any of this. She points her knife at his chest and his ribs shift from how hard his heart would have beaten if it could.

He tells himself it is the addiction, it is not her, but she was never around until her veins started shaking. He tries to pray for her, but her name turns to blood in his mouth.

And to her, his body is a means to an end. And to her, he is all teeth.

*

He goes to Magnus because he's out of faith, and Magnus could always pour belief into him like a potion. This time, it is not because he is rejected by God, but because he is at war with his skin, this body turned unfamiliar twice over, and he's clawing through the dirt again in his mind, suffocating despite not needing to breathe. It's like his first day in a casket, pressing his palms flat against the walls and thinking how easy it would be to let the ground consume him again.

He tells Magnus how his mouth turned traitor, how it felt like all of his bones were turned inside out, how he hadn't known vampires could vomit. Magnus says something that starts with _bloodlust_ and Raphael’s throat stings, the backs of his eyes hurt, he says “I've always hated that word.”

Magnus says something that ends with _repulsion_ and the syllables tuck themselves into Raphael’s ribs, humming like a heartbeat, like something human.

*

_Did being a vampire make you like this?_

_No. Someone like you did._

  
***

  
Meliorn looks at him and says her name and Raphael's thoughts stagger, but he does not flinch, not even at the implication that he still smells like her. Instead, he looks Meliorn in the eye and tries to prove that his clan is his highest priority. He knows Meliorn thinks his reaction is defensive, an attempt to convince them she hasn't compromised his loyalties; Raphael tries not to think about how his support has more to do with the Seelie than with the Shadowhunter.

She finds him after the massacre and he wants to list the names of the dead, spit on every rune on the Institute’s floor. Instead, he says goodbye.

*

He finds Meliorn carving butterflies into the ground, as close to the Institute as he can get. There are tears tracing the paths of his scars. Raphael thinks this man might understand the desire to spit on their symbols, to desecrate something, so he tells him. Meliorn turns to look at him, slow, deliberate, and smiles.

“I am glad you did not. You never would have been released, and then you could not sit with me.”

So he sits.

*

There was a boy, once, about a decade after he turned. When Raphael had pulled away from his touch, fingers unconsciously reaching for his cross, he'd looked at Raphael and shaken his head.

“We're fucking damned anyway, why do you act like it matters?”

Now, Raphael presses the pendant into his palm and looks at Magnus. “How did you become okay with it?”

Magnus gives a flourish of his hand. “After the whole ‘half demon blood, scorned by the earth as a monster’ thing, liking boys wasn't that big of a deal.” He sees Raphael's expression and adds gently, “But it's different for everyone.”

Raphael looks at his hands. Lets go of the cross. “How do I become okay with it?”

Magnus sighs. “The only man I know who went from being extremely closeted to out and self-accepting who's currently alive blames you for his sister’s addiction. And since you refuse to learn how to use a computer, I guess we'll have to get creative.”

  
***

  
Months later, he carries a folder of paper butterflies to the edge of the Institute property. Magnus had helped him draw them, despite saying, “In my experience, it's generally unacceptable to attempt to woo someone via mourning ritual.”

He knows Meliorn will be there, that he comes every week to clean the carvings, and sometimes to add new ones. He tells himself that Meliorn does so at night so that fewer Shadowhunters notice him.

They toss the butterflies into the air and watch them fly onto Institute grounds. Meliorn looks at him with that half-smile. “Magnus's doing?” Raphael shrugs.

They watch the Institute in the dark as the butterflies settle over every rune outside, covering sections of the paths, the walls. A new symbolism. A new kind of sacred. They're both facing forward when Meliorn speaks.

“They were willing to kill me because they did not trust themselves to ask the right questions, because they were unwilling to believe someone who is forced to tell the truth. They think somehow that being capable of lying makes them less deceitful. It should be laughable.”

They both know it isn't.

“Aldertree cuffed me to a chair,” Raphael says. The words force themselves past all the safeguards in his throat; he's only ever told Magnus. “Tried out some new device on me. I've always hated technology.”

Meliorn smiles at that, but it's the smile he uses when he's carving butterflies, when he's fighting, when he's calmly suggesting an assassination. Raphael wonders if the Clave just wanted an excuse to kill him—maybe that was the case for both of them.

Raphael has been sneaking glances, but Meliorn turns and looks directly into his eyes.

“They are afraid of us.”

“No kidding.”

*

The first time Meliorn invites him home, Raphael says no, one hand on the cross and the other in his pocket, clenching the fabric tight. The second time, Meliorn smiles at him, languid, lazy with eternity. “I am not propositioning you, Raphael, I believe in much better communication that that. I am not expecting sex or asking for it. I am saying please, sleep in my bed.”

Raphael feels a phantom heartbeat racing beneath his ribs. He says yes.

It's almost dawn when they get to Meliorn’s home, and Raphael pauses in the doorway, blinking, expecting a different view every time his eyelids lift.

The room must have been almost entirely windows, based on the size of the curtains. He has no idea how Meliorn attached the one on the ceiling. There is scenery on the fabric; even though the room is dark, Meliorn has filled it with the sun.

“Are you comfortable with this?” Meliorn asks, before putting his arm around him at Raphael’s nod. His body does not feel like a side effect, like an annoying but necessary vehicle for his brain, for the uncertainty of a soul.

He prays before he falls asleep, like something more than a habit. _On earth as it is in heaven._ He believes it.

**Author's Note:**

> come yell with me about these two or anything Shadowhunters on tumblr @basilhallward or on my downworlder appreciation sideblog @downworldersdeservebetter


End file.
